Chapurukha (Chap) Kusimba is with the Anthropology Department of the American University in Washington D.C, having been recently with the Field Museum and the University of Illinois in Chicago. He holds his degrees from Bryn Mawr (Ph.D.) and Kenyatta University in Nairobi. His specialties include the archaeology of complex societies and the origins of inequality, ancient African chiefdoms and states, urbanism in Africa, Islam in Africa, and the African Diaspora in Asia and the Americas. He is Director and Co-Director of a number research projects, including “Ancient Trade Between China and East Africa”, the Chaul-Palshet Archaeological Program in Pune, India, and the Mount Elgon Anthropological Research Program (Kenya and Uganda).